At the Guardian Activate Conference 2010

I was at the Guardian Activate Summit 2010 last week; a day-long conference looking at the internet, communications technology, the media, development, business and various other issues (including, for some reason, research into the curing of old age...).

With over 50 speakers, and as a "new media" event, there was a fair amount at the conference that was either not relevant to me, or that was completely pointless, but shiny, verbal fluff.

The speakers that really jumped out for me were:

Ethan Zuckerman (Founder, Global Voices)

Danny O'Brien (Internet Advocacy Co-ordinator, Committee to Protect Journalists)

Juliana Rotich (Co-Founder, Ushahidi)

Rose Shuman (Founder, OpenMind & Question Box)

Sameer Padania (Former Manager, the Hub, Witness)

Clay Shirky (Author, Here Comes Everybody)

Eric Schmidt (CEO & Chair, Google)


I'll post some ideas about these speakers and their work soon.

The Flotilla: How Much Did Video Rock the Boat?

This post is a little late, as the furore in the media about the flotilla seems to have, inevitably, died down somewhat, and some analysis of the use of video during the raid on the Gaza Flotilla has been carried out already. I doubt, though, that this issue is going away altogether any time soon.

But with the benefit of a little hindsight, it seems a good time to look at the Gaza flotilla raid, and in particular at the impact that the presence of video footage had on the incident itself, and on the media and political aftermath.

This will not be a discussion of where blame lies regarding the violence on board the flotilla, or a discussion of the wider Israel/Palestine context, because I'm not qualified enough to discuss that usefully, and because that's not the focus of this blog. Also, the various issues have been discussed at length and without much useful conclusion elsewhere.

The raid by the Iraeli military of the Gaza flotilla took place early in the morning on the 31st of May. Though official press releases were put out by both the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Free Gaza Movement, which had been involved in organising the flotilla, and both sides had prepared to record video footage of the raid prior to it happening (the IDF with cameras mounted on their boats and helicopter, the Gaza Flotilla hosting Al Jazeera crew and reporter and setting up a live video webcast).

However, the first time many people (including myself) were aware of the raid was when they read about it on Twitter/Facebook, and via the video footage broadcast by Al Jazeera (on the internet).

So, let's start there:

Al Jazeera Video

It's worth pointing out that this isn't citizen journalism as such. The Al Jazeera footage is a combination of professionally shot news footage, surveillance camera footage and some amateur footage.

We see a short piece of surveillance camera footage of IDF soldiers on the deck of the ship, carrying weapons, then some (presumably) professional footage of boats alongside the larger ship.

We see some unattributed footage of people lying on the floor in the ship's corridors, and a woman carrying a stretcher with a large blood stain on it, while an Al Jazeera correspondent reports on the events, from the ship.

After some more general footage, we hear what could possibly be a gunshot, as the reporter states that live fire can still be heard. We see people milling about on the deck of the ship, before they are ushered inside. The Al Jazeera reporter signs off.

The main message here is that this is pretty poor footage. It's not particularly informative, revealing, or even attention-grabbing. Try watching it with the sound down, and it becomes more or less nonsensical.

Amateur footage makes up very little of the footage here, and most vitally, it does not actually capture any violence or abuses perpetrated by either party. Claims made by the narrator about gunshots or violence are left without any support, and evidence of violence is only recorded after the fact.

Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs Video

The IMFA released a video apparently showing Israeli soldiers issuing warnings in English and Arabic to the flotilla boats.

However, there's absolutely no way of telling whether the footage is authentic; of telling where or when this warning is being issued; or even of telling whether the warning is even reaching the flotilla boats.

IMFA Press Release

The IMFA then sent out a press release stating that two pistols had been found on two of the activists aboard the flotilla ship, and claimed these had been stolen from IDF soldiers.

At this point, the Al Jazeera video report came out, after which we get the first piece of real, amateur "citizen journalism" from the boat:

@justincentric Video

This begins with some shaky footage of the inside of the boat, as the cameraperson moves through a hatchway. We see some blood on the hatchway. There is some footage showing boats alongside the larger ship.

A voice is speaking in Arabic. Then a voice begins speaking in English, explaining that injuries have occurred. We see footage of various apparently injured people.

We hear the narrator state that the ship is being attacked from all sides with smoke grenades and live rounds, though the video footage does not show these attacks.

An Arabic-speaking reporter then appears. The footage points into the dark night sky (showing absolutely nothing) and then pans around the relatively empty deck of the ship.

We see a man being carried down some steps. Then we see a man on the deck of the ship with his face wrapped in black cloth holding a metal rod. Off the deck we can see a smaller boat.

More footage of apparently injured people being carried down the stairs. Then what looks like a repeat of earlier footage, moving through a bloodied hatch and onto the deck. The narrator states that there has been live ammunition fired, and that people have been injured.

The narrator claims that the IDF have tried to dismantle the satellite through which the footage is being broadcast. He then claims that the ship is raising a white flag, though, again, there's no footage shown of this. More footage is shown of apparently injured men.

The narrator claims that the IDF are still shooting, despite the white flag being raised, though the footage shown is of boats off the side of the larger boat.

The video then becomes quite confused. There is a lot of dialogue in Arabic, and shots of people moving about on deck. Someone speaks through a megaphone, and a conversation appears to be taking place between the person with the megaphone and a person on deck. In the midst of this, we hear what sounds like a gun being shot.

Then, finally some footage of an actual event taking place, we see IDF soldiers in black uniforms dropping onto the boat on ropes, presumably from a helicopter above. There is a small crowd of people in orange lifejackets, some of whom are carrying metal pipes. Some of the crowd appear to attack the IDF soldiers. (This, presumably, is at the same time that the IDF footage (see below) was shot.)

The filming and editing is very erratic, jumpy and chaotic. We see an IDF soldier hit with a pipe, who then is seen to be carrying a rifle. We see the IDF helicopter overhead.

The video then repeats a segment from the earlier Al Jazeera video, suggesting that this video was made available to Al Jazeera before it was put on YouTube. More importantly, this also suggests that Al Jazeera chose to use some more conventional footage featuring their reporter instead of the amateur footage showing the IDF soldiers descending on the ship.

We then hear a loudspeaker announcement apparently by a flotilla member advising those on the flotilla not to resist the IDF soldiers for their own safety, as the IDF are firing live ammunition. Finally, we see the same footage as appeared in the AJ video, shot on surveillance cameras, of the IDF soldiers milling about on the deck. It sounds like a gunshot is fired, but it is difficult to specify by who or where.

Not to condemn the filmmakers, as they were operating in extremely stressful, apparently dangerous circumstances, but the footage is extremely poor, and does little to convince those not already sympathetic to their cause that they were the victims of an unprovoked and disproportionate attack. While video is not the only tool by which the facts of the Gaza Flotilla Raid can be confirmed, the fact that both parties involved made a priority of capturing video of the incident shows that they understand the potential impact and power that video has to tell a story, and capture the facts. Unfortunately, the Gaza Flotilla footage is too chaotic and amateurish to do so.

IDF Footage of Raid

After various reactions to the Gaza Flotilla footage, the IDF then released their own, apparently shot from the IDF helicopter.

This is black and white, aerial footage without sound, and therefore difficult to understand or relate to. It starts with the first IDF soldier landing on the ship from the helicopter. He is apparently attacked, as are other IDF soldiers. We see a couple of objects being thrown, and it is claimed that these are a stun grenade and a firebomb. It seems there is fighting going on, but it is difficult to make out specific parties.

What is clear, though, is that by the end of the video there are numerous people lying on the deck of the ship, presumably either dead, injured or attempting to protect themselves.

IDF Footage of Raid 2

The IDF then posted a second video - more conventional footage, this time, though still black and white and without sound - apparently showing IDF soldiers being attacked by Gaza Flotilla passengers.

This footage shows the IDF soldiers being attacked with fists, pipes and plastic chairs by Gaza Flotilla passengers as they board. It also shows one IDF soldier being pushed from the deck onto a lifeboat by some Gaza Flotilla passengers. Finally, it shows the soldiers pointing their guns (and possibly a paintball gun?) at the Gaza Flotilla passengers, who seem to back away.

In some ways, though supplemented with propagandistic language and captions, this footage is actually more effective in portraying what took place than the footage captured by the Gaza Flotilla passengers, or even the professional Al Jazeera camera crew. However, it still fails to portray the context in which these incidents took place. If, as some accounts claim, the IDF had been shooting at the Gaza Flotilla prior to the boarding by helicopter, the attacks on the IDF soldiers can be ascribed a different motivation - self-defence, rather than aggression.

Now, as if things weren't already murky, this is the point at which the propaganda steps up, particularly on the IDF side. I'm not interested in post-event, propagandistic video, so I won't analyse it here. It can all be found on the links posted previously.

After the Event

Somewhat predictably, what we saw in the days and weeks after the event was a tennis match of footage and supplementary video, written accounts, interviews, etc. Rather than providing greater detail (though obviously some of the information will have been of use), this muddied the waters and discouraged mainstream media and the average member of the public from paying the incident further attention.

To some extent this was inevitable. The Israeli Defence Force is particularly adept at propaganda and information "flooding", and the numerous parties involved in the Gaza Flotilla and their supporters, due to the passionate feelings connected with the Israel/Palestine situation, have inevitably bombarded the internet with their varyingly reliable opinions and accounts of the incident.

On the other hand, if any of the original footage produced by either sides (or, possibly, an unbiased third party) had succeeded in capturing the incident properly - with proper context; footage of the violent incidents as they took place, and in the order they took place; with multiple angles and viewpoints, and without unfounded commentary - and if the footage had been properly verified, authenticated and packaged afterwards, then such propaganda, speculation and information overload would have been, if not prevented, then delayed long enough for more key facts to come to light. Furthermore, mainstream news outlets such as Al Jazeera may have been more inclined to use this video in their reports, allowing it to reach a wider audience.

As it is, we are left with a smattering of more or less useless footage and the hope of an independent inquiry taking place a significant length of time after the fact. A pretty poor outcome, especially given the sacrifices involved.

For an example of how this can be done, you should check out B'Tselem's Shooting Back project, and the Heb2.tv project.

As a final note, it's interesting to note that one of the best accounts of the Gaza Flotilla raid can be found on Wikipedia. This confirms one of the points raised in Jeff Jarvis' blog (see previous post), that with this kind of controversial, trickling-in news story, Wikis will become increasingly valuable sources of news. Next time a story like this come along, I recommend looking to Wikipedia (with some reservations, obviously!).

Jeff Jarvis' Musings

I have my reservations about Jeff Jarvis' discussions of the future of media, less to do with what he says, which is generally interesting enough (to the extent that predictions about a pretty unpredictable industry can be) than with what he omits.

His focus is very West-centric, and he tends to talk a lot about methods of news distribution, methods of news consumption, and the economics of media in the future, but he tends not to talk about CONTENT, or production of news. Maybe I missed the blog post where he does that, or maybe he just doesn't consider it worth talking about. Anyway, from a recent half-hour talk he gave to a Scandinavian conference on the future of media, here's some key points for me.

1) Mobile - Mobile news production and consumption and local news production and consumption are increasingly part of the same process, and for those with smartphones etc, local news will become ubiquitous and constant. Based on where someone is standing at any given moment, or based on what a person is looking at (or pointing their camera phone at) at any given moment, the simple volume of information potentially available is overwhelming. History, reviews, photos, video, recent events, government reports, planning documents, artwork etc etc etc will be available simply by pointing your camera (phone) at a location.

The same is also true, of course, of Google maps and Microsoft's recent developments in mapping, but Jarvis is keen to emphasise the local nature of this consumption. The local aspect, though interesting in terms of community empowerment, communication and identity, is less interesting to me than the communication of important "local" news to a global audience.

However, this again illustrates the changing relationship between the news producer and the consumer. The consumer no longer sits at a table and is offered a menu, but instead can ask for anything at all that they want to eat.

2) Content is everywhere. Originally content was defined as "what broadcasters make", but the internet turns almost everything into potential "content" for consumption. You just have to be able to see the value (or valuable content) within the wider content. And the key point is that for many, producing such content costs as close to nothing as makes no difference.

However, this only applies to certain kinds of content, and the "no cost" factor is relative. It costs nothing if you already have electricity, a laptop, internet connection, smartphone, digital video camera, etc. If you don't have those things, nothing much has changed.

In addition, the media can add many things to this mountain of "content" produced for free by the global, internet-connected public:

- Authority: Applying traditional journalistic principles, cross-referencing, balancing accounts, etc.
- Clarification: Getting facts and quotes straight, and dispelling rumour and hyperbole.
- Summation/collation: Picking out and making presentable the valuable information from the white noise and repetition.
- Centralisation: Offering a single, reliable source of information.

3) This third one I think is very important.

News becomes a process, not a product; a constant flow, akin to news wires rather than broadcasters or newspapers. There is less value and marketability in offering a single, packaged product. Instead, news becomes a rolling, growing process with contributions from various parties over time (think of Wikis).

One of the key shifts for media here is to somewhat abandon the idea of a "perfect", "finished" product. Such a product was not only a product of traditional, timed news media (daily papers, evening news), but was not truly representative of "news" at all.

Furthermore, the trend appears to be that the public needs to arrive earlier in the process of news production, rather than being granted a final product. This can be achieved using Wikis, links, comments, blogs, video, etc etc etc. There are risks and whole full-time jobs involved in managing this process (according to the "what media can offer" list above), but the benefit is a wealth of free information, some of it otherwise unobtainable, and a committed audience.

4) Whatever "products" are created have to be open, accessible, findable, and not hidden behind a paywall. Online video needs to be all of these things, for example.

5) Those who succeed will likely be those who are fastest to make their "products" available. This means prioritising speed over quality (though not abandoning quality altogether - it's a balancing act), and remembering that, as above, there's no need to produce a final, "finished" product as once it is in the public domain it will grow and improve and change.

6) Media broadcasters/organs will have to shrink. This means fewer people handling more external content, but fewer contacts and avenues in.

I think that about covers it!